eXp Realty was founded in 2009 and is one of the fastest growing real estate brokerages that offers a virtual three-dimensional immersive office space, eXp World, through its sister company VirBELA. With more than 29,000 real estate agents in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, eXp World is the real estate company’s headquarters.
Real estate agents have 24/7 access to eXp World which provides a collaborative space for online staff meetings and training sessions. It is staffed with nearly 600 team members during business hours to offer virtual support on transactions, IT issues, payment processing and other services.
Justin Mason, a eXp real estate agent in Arkansas, said the company has a low overhead fee which allows it to offer a 80/20 commission split along with revenue share. “What I love most about the company is all the wonderful real estate agents from around the world sharing their knowledge to help others succeed,” he said.
VirBELA is an immersive technology platform that creates cloud-based virtual worlds for organizations and companies, like eXp Realty, similar to a video game design with customized avatars. Imagine the Fortnight of a virtual world for productivity and education. They are digital spaces for individuals to learn and collaborate regardless of their physical location.
eXp Realty partnered with VirBELA in 2016 to develop eXp World. The cloud-based platform has revolutionized the company which was named one of the “Best Places to Work” by Glassdoor in 2017, 2018 and 2020. The real estate company is leading the way for other companies across industries to operate remotely and virtually.
Mason said the cloud-based eXp World is user friendly. “Essentially, all you do is log in from your computer or phone, find the person, room or meeting you are looking for and then you can listen and speak live,” he said. “You have a customized avatar that walks through the virtual campus. If I have an issue, it is so much easier to go to the eXp World and talk live with someone rather than emailing back and forth or leaving voicemails.”
VirBELA’s Open Campus is a free cloud-based world which can host thousands of avatars at collaborative events, meetings, classes and other gatherings. Immersive, digital spaces like eXp World and Open Campus allow companies the opportunity to operate without brick-and-mortar costs or commute issues for individuals.
In the past three months, VirBELA sales grew by more than 600 percent and traffic to its Open Campus increased 450 percent.
Laval Virtual is an annual international exhibition and conference on augmented and virtual reality. More than 6,600 people from 110 countries attended Laval Virtual World 2020 in April which VirBELA helped develop. It took place in their private virtual event campus, hosting sessions, business meetings, an awards ceremony, as well as fun activities and challenges.
More businesses and organizations are seeking innovative solutions for working remotely that enables collaboration to build a work community and culture virtually.
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